A variety of compositions for cleaning hard surfaces have been disclosed in the art. Much of the focus for such compositions has been on providing outstanding cleaning on a variety of surfaces and soils. For some specialised cleaners, such as glass cleaners, much effort has additionally been devoted to the formulation of so-called "streak-free" products, i.e. products which leave no or little visible residues after use.
The object of the present invention is to formulate hard surface cleaning compositions which clean and provide gloss to the cleaned surface. That is different from a "streak-free" composition, in that gloss additionally requires improved reflectance of light from the cleaned surface. A variety of products are commercially available for delivering gloss to surfaces, and they are disclosed for instance in U.S. Pat. No. 3,960,575 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,218,250. Both references recommend the use of various silicones for delivering gloss. Such compositions are not fully formulated hard surface cleaners, so that they do not clean efficiently, and indeed the formulation of silicone in hard surface cleaners has not shown any gloss benefits. See for instance EP 374 471 which discloses a hard surface cleaning composition with, amongst other essentials, a silicone for improved resistance to soil redeposition.
We have now found that superior gloss on surface can be obtained from a hard surface cleaning composition comprising a sulphonated homopolymer of (poly) styrene or a sulphonated copolymer of styrene with an ethylenically unsaturated comonomer, or mixtures of said polymers.
Suitable Polystyrenes sulphonates for use herein are disclosed for instance in "Multifunctional Sulphonated Polymers for Household Applications", J. Guth et Al. Happi, December '94. The Guth article mentions that the key benefit of such polymers in the context of hard surface cleaners is anti soil redeposition, but does not discuss gloss.